Posted on 01/29/2005 8:32:29 PM PST by ijcr
A 25-year-old waitress who turned down a job providing "sexual services'' at a brothel in Berlin faces possible cuts to her unemployment benefit under laws introduced this year.
Prostitution was legalised in Germany just over two years ago and brothel owners – who must pay tax and employee health insurance – were granted access to official databases of jobseekers.
The waitress, an unemployed information technology professional, had said that she was willing to work in a bar at night and had worked in a cafe.
She received a letter from the job centre telling her that an employer was interested in her "profile'' and that she should ring them. Only on doing so did the woman, who has not been identified for legal reasons, realise that she was calling a brothel.
Under Germany's welfare reforms, any woman under 55 who has been out of work for more than a year can be forced to take an available job – including in the sex industry – or lose her unemployment benefit. Last month German unemployment rose for the 11th consecutive month to 4.5 million, taking the number out of work to its highest since reunification in 1990.
The government had considered making brothels an exception on moral grounds, but decided that it would be too difficult to distinguish them from bars. As a result, job centres must treat employers looking for a prostitute in the same way as those looking for a dental nurse.
When the waitress looked into suing the job centre, she found out that it had not broken the law. Job centres that refuse to penalise people who turn down a job by cutting their benefits face legal action from the potential employer.
"There is now nothing in the law to stop women from being sent into the sex industry," said Merchthild Garweg, a lawyer from Hamburg who specialises in such cases. "The new regulations say that working in the sex industry is not immoral any more, and so jobs cannot be turned down without a risk to benefits."
Miss Garweg said that women who had worked in call centres had been offered jobs on telephone sex lines. At one job centre in the city of Gotha, a 23-year-old woman was told that she had to attend an interview as a "nude model", and should report back on the meeting. Employers in the sex industry can also advertise in job centres, a move that came into force this month. A job centre that refuses to accept the advertisement can be sued.
Tatiana Ulyanova, who owns a brothel in central Berlin, has been searching the online database of her local job centre for recruits.
"Why shouldn't I look for employees through the job centre when I pay my taxes just like anybody else?" said Miss Ulyanova.
Ulrich Kueperkoch wanted to open a brothel in Goerlitz, in former East Germany, but his local job centre withdrew his advertisement for 12 prostitutes, saying it would be impossible to find them.
Mr Kueperkoch said that he was confident of demand for a brothel in the area and planned to take a claim for compensation to the highest court. Prostitution was legalised in Germany in 2002 because the government believed that this would help to combat trafficking in women and cut links to organised crime.
Miss Garweg believes that pressure on job centres to meet employment targets will soon result in them using their powers to cut the benefits of women who refuse jobs providing sexual services.
"They are already prepared to push women into jobs related to sexual services, but which don't count as prostitution,'' she said.
"Now that prostitution is no longer considered by the law to be immoral, there is really nothing but the goodwill of the job centres to stop them from pushing women into jobs they don't want to do."
Unfortunately this is way too German for words.
"If you don't wear a seat belt, it will cause my insurance to go up..."
Anti-smoking campaigns were invented by the Nazis, BTW.
Who also forced women into prostitution.
That's what the Feminazi's want!! They want to become Priests, they even wanted to do away with Urinal's!!!
Who do you think is behind and along side the Homosexual Push in this country!! You better WAKE UP my friend!! Our Country is being torn to shreds!!
No this is not funny at all, what is funny is that we are allowing it to happen at all!
You certianly don't have to take my word for it.
Here, read for yourself:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/hearings.asp?formmode=view&id=954
LMAO!!!!
This is the secular socialism that the Democrat Party relentlessly struggles to bring to America. I thank God every day that Bush won re-election. I still have the smile on my face from November 2nd.
Defintly off the deep end!! That's for sure. The New World Order!!
The European culture is imploding. They have no morals and evidently no civil protections.
Ever notice things happen first in EU and it might take years, but eventually the Libs and Feminists here catch right up to them. Makes ya wonder.
Bizarre, you say? A horrendous miscarriage of justice? Just how far do you think that the United States is away from this madness? Just about as far as most of our liberal politicians.
If a woman has a "the right to her own body" I don't see why she can't whore it out for cash.
Morals break down when a society rejects religion, and the government becomes the head pimp in legalized sexual slavery.
Oh yes!! THere is no darkness, only the absence of light, there is no cold, only absnece of heat. hence what is the absence of God?
Ditto.
If this was in our country....the woman would sue on this law based on age discrimination!
A fascinating story.
One reason that I am opposed to liberalism (progressiveism, socialism, call it what you will) is their concept of social engineering.
Social engineering fails fundamentally because of the law of unintended consequences.
And the law of unintended consequences is particularly pernicious for large, complicated systems, such as social systems.
And liberals consistently forget this and attempt more social engineering.
So the Germans thought that they could solve a crime problem by legalising prostitution. I bet they didn't think that sexual slavery would be the outcome.
Well I thank God he won also, but I wouldn't bet my tail on Bush preventing Secular Socialism and the New World Order!!
Shocking! I hope we never become that stupid.
You are preaching to the choir here, FRiend. And my point was, not ALL or even a majority of women support the feminist philosophy, so reveling in the degrading of those of the female sex is very disturbing to me. I noticed you did not respond to my query about the male sex being required to "put their hands on the wall and spread 'em" for any male homosexuals that they would be forced to issue customer service to in the local "whore house". I'm sure the Euros couldn't be so politically incorrect as to allow the unemployed straight males, to turn down good paying jobs as paid sex partners to homosexual male customers.
The slippery slope is expecting "benefits" from the government. They will eventually "own" you.
Even 3rd world countries would be mortified by this!
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